Is there any point switching tariff at the moment?

[sat1983]

Any cheap electricity provider out there? I’m with utility warehouse, they charge £0.27/kw which by my reckoning it’ll cost £15.66 to charge my EV.
That’s decent but with the price of electricity rising by another 65% - that £0.27 becomes £0.44 or £25 for a full charge.

In these current times is there cheaper out there?

[dave01253]

I'm on "octopus go". I signed up in May. its a 2 rate tariff. 7.5p from 00.30-04.30 and then 34.35p 04.30-00.30

I only use 4 or 5 kw in the day including winter so I use more overnight charging than I do in the day.

If you want to go on to octopus, let me know as I get 50 pound referral and you get 50 pound as well.

[RazerSauber]

I'm with UW too. No idea about the price in such detail but we found it was about £30 cheaper per month to go with them than any other provider and we got their surprisingly good broadband essentially for free too. A month in and they recalculated our gas bill and knocked £50 a month off so £80 a month better off with broadband. I can't complain. I will, of course, when the prices rise to even more ludicrous levels.

[s20544]

You can ask for a change in the direct debit whichever supplier you are with. It is rather the unit price of the energy that will ultimately influence what you owe.

[somouk]

If you have a 7KW charger and charge at home a lot then one of the tariffs with the cheap overnight might be the right way to go. You need to compare the usage pattern and work out if the inflated normal unit rate is worth the offset you will save charging the car overnight.

If you don’t have a fast charger then it’s not worth swapping really, check out Martin Lewis’ page on Facebook, he gives out lots of useful advice on this sort of thing at the moment.

[gareth h]

somouk said:

If you have a 7KW charger and charge at home a lot then one of the tariffs with the cheap overnight might be the right way to go. You need to compare the usage pattern and work out if the inflated normal unit rate is worth the offset you will save charging the car overnight.

If you don’t have a fast charger then it’s not worth swapping really, check out Martin Lewis’ page on Facebook, he gives out lots of useful advice on this sort of thing at the moment.

I’ve been thinking about picking up an EV as a runabout and using an off peak tariff, has anybody fitted a battery in the house to also charge on the off peak tariff?

[somouk]

It’s possibly but batteries and fitting are expensive and don’t last forever so you would need to factor in how much you might save against a large initial outlay.

[dapprman]

Other thing about a battery is you'll not get much of a car charge from one, plus they do have a maximum output, so I think my 10kWh unit has a maximum output of about 3-3.5kW, so even if I just plug my car in for an hour I am still pulling around 3.5-4kW from the grid. Added to which it will never be 100% at that point as the house will have been drawing power from it post the sun not shining enough on my panels (and then going down), so depending on what PC games I've been playing and for how long, I can be down to just 2-4kWh left in the battery by the time I hit the sack, so less by the time the scheduling hits in for charging my car.
For example this is my graph from last night covering 3 hours of car charging, and also includes putting around 6kWh back in to my battery.

[tedblog]

My neighbour has just taken delivery of his ev car and has gone through looking at switching.
Seems Octopus is the only good one now , a couple of others would take hime on but then his normal tariff increases.
Most of the others have suspended it.
Think its a case of sitting tight with whoever you are already with.
The next price cap review is in October with an increase in price of around 65% , at least his BIK is only 2% and he keeps reminding me that im helping it keep that low !

[HelldogBE]

dapprman said:

Other thing about a battery is you'll not get much of a car charge from one, plus they do have a maximum output, so I think my 10kWh unit has a maximum output of about 3-3.5kW, so even if I just plug my car in for an hour I am still pulling around 3.5-4kW from the grid. Added to which it will never be 100% at that point as the house will have been drawing power from it post the sun not shining enough on my panels (and then going down), so depending on what PC games I've been playing and for how long, I can be down to just 2-4kWh left in the battery by the time I hit the sack, so less by the time the scheduling hits in for charging my car.
For example this is my graph from last night covering 3 hours of car charging, and also includes putting around 6kWh back in to my battery.

Very interesting use of the cheap charging window by charging both your car & home battery from the grid!
How fast are you earning your investment back and is it similar to a solar setup that the inverter (and possibly battery) are only given about 10 years of life?

[dapprman]

HelldogBE said:

dapprman said:

Other thing about a battery is you'll not get much of a car charge from one, plus they do have a maximum output, so I think my 10kWh unit has a maximum output of about 3-3.5kW, so even if I just plug my car in for an hour I am still pulling around 3.5-4kW from the grid. Added to which it will never be 100% at that point as the house will have been drawing power from it post the sun not shining enough on my panels (and then going down), so depending on what PC games I've been playing and for how long, I can be down to just 2-4kWh left in the battery by the time I hit the sack, so less by the time the scheduling hits in for charging my car.
For example this is my graph from last night covering 3 hours of car charging, and also includes putting around 6kWh back in to my battery.

Very interesting use of the cheap charging window by charging both your car & home battery from the grid!
How fast are you earning your investment back and is it similar to a solar setup that the inverter (and possibly battery) are only given about 10 years of life?

The prediction from the supplier I think was 7 years, though partly because I got a very good discount as I'm an early install for them. Battery is 10 years from what I remember, panels and inverter I can't remember but were meant to be longer, I would need to check the paperwork. I suspect the limits I see in battery performance are purposely done to help longevity.
In just under a year the warranty is up on my Chargemaster home charger. I fancy getting a Zappi and connecting it to my system so during the summer I can put excess power to the car rather than the grid (I'm getting just 5p per kWh). Thing is at present off peak charges, if that were to cost me £1000 between the Zappi purchase and install and anything I can get for the old unit, then I will need to put 5000 kWh in to the car to break even on that, and at present that's 3-4 years of driving. I will still probably go ahead and do it.